Janet Kwasniak's blog on consciousness and the brain

Tag Archives: fluency

It is not just true that if something is not understood, it is assumed to be easily done. It is also true that if it is easier to grasp then it is more likeable. A recent study looked at this connection between fluency and appreciation. (Forster M, Gerger G, Leder H (2015) Everything’s Relative? Relative Differences in Processing Fluency and the Effects on Liking. PloS ONE 10(8): e0135944. doi:10.1371/journal. pone.0135944)

The question Forster asks is whether the judgement of fluency is absolute or relative. If we have internal reference standards for liking that depend on the ease of perceiving then the level of liking is an absolute judgement. Internal standards seem to be the case for perfect pitch and the feeling of familiarity when something is recalled from memory. But in the case of the effort of perception, our feeling of liking is a relative judgement – a comparison with other amounts of effort for other images.

Abstract: “Explanations of aesthetic pleasure based on processing fluency have shown that ease-of-processing fosters liking. What is less clear, however, is how processing fluency arises. Does it arise from a relative comparison among the stimuli presented in the experiment? Or does it arise from a comparison to an internal reference or standard? To address these questions, we conducted two experiments in which two ease-of-processing manipulations were applied: either (1) within-participants, where relative comparisons among stimuli varying in processing ease were possible, or (2) between-participants, where no relative comparisons were possible. In total, 97 participants viewed simple line drawings with high or low visual clarity, presented at four different presentation durations, and rated for felt fluency, liking, and certainty. Our results show that the manipulation of visual clarity led to differences in felt fluency and certainty regardless of being manipulated within- or between-participants. However, liking ratings were only affected when ease-of-processing was manipulated within-participants. Thus, feelings of fluency do not depend on the nature of the reference. On the other hand, participants liked fluent stimuli more only when there were other stimuli varying in ease-of-processing. Thus, relative differences in fluency seem to be crucial for liking judgements.”